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History

Lynda K. Yankaskas ‌

Associate Professor of History Ettinger 300A 484-664-3326

Education: B. A., with High Honors, Swarthmore College Ph.D., Brandeis University

Teaching and Research Fields: I am a social and cultural historian of early America, with particular interests in the history of print culture, nation-formation, public space, and gender. My current research project examines social (or subscription) libraries to explore the meanings of reading as a public activity, and the ways that national and local identity and questions of class were mediated through trans-Atlantic print culture in the late colonial period and the early American republic. In particular, my work argues that print culture could be as much an anti-democratic force as a democratic one in the young American nation.

My teaching, like my research, is heavily concerned with questions of community and identity. I teach courses in colonial and Revolutionary-era America as well as topical courses on gender, the family, immigration, legal history, social protest, and book history. My topical courses cover the full chronological range of U.S. history from the colonial period to the modern era. Many of my courses serve the programs in Women's & Gender Studies and American Studies. All of my classes are discussion-based and ask students to engage with a wide range of primary sources.

Courses Taught:First-Year Seminar: American Utopias

Introductory courses: Reformers and Radicals in U. S. History Remembering the American Revolution Coming to America

Advanced courses: Colonial America Revolutionary America Women's America American Families Constitutional History of the U.S. Popular Protests: Parades, Riots, and Mass Movements in U. S. History Texts/Contexts: The History of Reading